


Let The Past Live

by Chthonia



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: A little fluffiness, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, And - this being Ben - a fair helping of angst too, F/M, Family Reunions, Kylo Ren Redemption, Mother-Son Relationship, POV Kylo Ren, a little sex, a little violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-15
Updated: 2018-02-15
Packaged: 2019-03-18 20:05:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,487
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13688859
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Chthonia/pseuds/Chthonia
Summary: Since escaping theSupremacywith Rey, Ben Solo has stayed out of sight as he grapples with who he is and what he has done. But now the time has come to travel to the Resistance base - and for Ben to face those he has hurt.





	Let The Past Live

**Author's Note:**

  * For [murakamism](https://archiveofourown.org/users/murakamism/gifts).



 

The yellowing leaves swirled around Ben's feet as he watched the _Falcon_ ease into the clearing. He swung his bag onto his shoulder. There hadn't been much to pack: years of monasticism followed by years of military ships had accustomed him to travelling light.

He waited under the trees, his gaze locked on the descending ramp. He never tired of watching Rey as she arrived on Takodana, of feeling her awe at the _life_ here. He had craved her response at first, back when her connection to the Force had felt like a fresh spring in the scorched earth of his soul. Now, he had found his own well, and could enjoy Rey's pleasure for the sheer joy of it.

She wasn't looking at the trees though, or at the little wooden hut that had been his home these last months. Her eyes found his and then she was running across the grass, hair streaming out behind. He strode to meet her, to catch her, to swing her around before setting her down, his arms around her as she stood with her head against his chest. She slipped her hands under his tunic; her arms tightened around his waist.

He wished they could stand like that forever.

 

* * *

 

_The first time, they'd been surrounded not by autumn leaves but falling flames as the façade of the old order burned. "Let it all die," he'd told her, but he'd still been clinging to that boy's dream of ruling the galaxy with his princess at his side. Until she'd reflected his words back at him, given him the choice between an empty ash-covered throne and a new dream that he'd never even imagined was possible._

_"We could rule together," he'd said. And she'd only shaken her head sadly, reached out her hand and invited him into the future._

_"Let the past die," she'd said, a quiver in her voice but her eyes steady on his. "That's the only way to become who you were meant to be."_

_And all he'd known in that moment was that they were meant to be together. They could never remember which of them had moved first, only that her body was pressed against his as he clung to her, his only anchor as he reeled from his Master's absence._

_His old life was gone: he could only move forward._

_Forward to what, he still didn't know._

 

* * *

 

He'd always found hyperspace mesmerising – a place out of time, a place between one set of expectations and another; a place as empty as he was.

'Kylo' had been less a person than a symbol, a mask his so-called Master had created to reduce him to nothing more than his bloodline. But 'Ben'… he'd never forget the thrill of recognition the first time Rey had called him that, but he couldn't pretend his crimes away just by changing his name. She seemed to view 'Ben' as some light-side version of himself who would rally to the cause of the Resistance, but it had been Ben who had chosen to go to Snoke in the first place.

Rey reached over from the pilot's seat and squeezed his hand. "It's going to be okay," she said.

He raised an eyebrow. "Really? Most of the Resistance would like to see me dead."

"Most of them have no idea who you are. As far as they're concerned, you're just a defector with some useful information."

He frowned. He wanted Rey: that was his only certainty. But he wanted to be more than a tool in the service of someone else's war.

He'd already told Rey what he could about the hierarchy of the First Order, in those early days before he'd turned inwards. This journey to the Resistance would not be an atonement – nothing could make up for what he'd done – but he hoped it would start to restore balance.

He was not a traitor. Kylo would have scoffed at the thought, but Ben's loyalty was to the Force now.

 

* * *

 

_It had been easy to steal his former Master's shuttle. It had been less easy to escape the ghosts of his former self._

_The first time he'd travelled on the ship he'd been a boy, grimed with soot and awed by the gold panelling after the privations of the Temple. Later, his tunic soaked with blood after his first mission as Snoke's acolyte, he'd hardly noticed the luxury in his excitement at striking a blow for the Dark side. And later still he'd grown to despise it, knowing it was hiding something rotten that he dared not look at more closely with Snoke's tentacles wound through his mind._

_He'd wanted to reach for Rey, but to so do amid these trappings of evil would have felt like corrupting their bond. So he'd let her fly while he'd stared out at the vacuum of star-streaked hyperspace._

_All his so-called mentors had betrayed him. His 'destiny' had been a mirage. How foolish he had been to think that he could offer her a place in the world._

_She was his only anchor now._

 

* * *

 

Rey eased them into orbit around a small blue planet. Ben watched as continents and storm systems appeared on the horizon and tracked beneath them. He'd never seen the place before, but somewhere down there were the last fragments of the life he had wrecked. Rey was reconnecting him, just as she'd helped him reconnect to the light side of the Force on Takodana. And just as on Takodana, he'd have to work out how to sustain the connection himself.

Let the past live. Let the past die.

But that could wait a little longer.

He caught her hand before she could operate the comm.

She shook her head. "We can't pull out now, Ben. They're expecting us."

"Not yet," he said. "This might be our last chance."

She touched his cheek. "Stop thinking like that, Ben. The only thing this is our last chance for is…" and she grinned, her eyes dancing, "…privacy."

She stood, tugging him out of his seat and leading him aft to her tiny cabin. He reached for her as soon as they were inside, but she stopped him with a hand on his chest. She shrugged off her vest and pulled her tunic over her head. And then she was standing in front of him, feet apart, boldly inviting him to look, to touch… He moved closer, brushing her breasts with the back of his hand. Her breath hitched.

He tore off his own tunic and pushed her back onto the bed, bracing himself over her as he dipped his head and circled her nipples with his tongue. And then her hands were at his waist, sliding down to fumble with his belt. He stood, watching her eyes darken as he kicked his trousers off, pulled at hers, and crawled back onto the bed. They reached for each other in the Force as they embraced. He gave himself up to the feel of her hands on his back, his skin warm under her fingers, her lips parting under his, his hair brushing her cheek, his heat stretching her as hers surrounded him. This was _life_ and he opened to it all: every point of contact between them aflame with lust and longing and love, every attempt to pull on the wider web of life looping back so the fire burned brighter and hotter and fiercer until they fused and cried out and shuddered through to peace.

He couldn't think. He didn't want to think. She sprawled across him, her head on his chest. He wrapped his arms around her.

But they couldn't float forever. "We'd better get down there," he grumbled, rolling over to fish in the pile of discarded clothing.

She pulled him back with a wicked smile.

"Not yet."

 

* * *

 

_Knowing they would be together had not made it easier to become together._

_When they'd stepped off the shuttle on Takodana, her hand in his had felt both utterly strange and utterly right. His dark clothes had felt both out of place amid the green and an integral part of who he was. And the girl beside him was a confidante whom he barely knew._

_They'd banished the awkwardness with practicalities – she'd stripped the shuttle of anything they could eat or sell while he'd rigged up a shelter under the trees. They'd eaten in silence, listening to the water lapping at the shore of the small lake._

_Only that morning he'd been surrounded by metal and stale air and hundreds of thousands of people. And now there they were, miles from anywhere else, breathing green-scented air and feeling the warmth of the planet's sun._

_It had been years… years of being hidden behind a mask or in a floating durasteel fortress. Just one more way Snoke had cut him off from what really mattered._

_He'd wandered to the shore, dipping his hand into the water and letting the breeze carry the drips away. And an image had flashed into his mind: a long-buried memory of a Naboo river swirling around his eight-year-old legs while behind him his parents-_

_He'd scowled. His clothes were_ definitely _wrong for this place._

 _He'd pulled off his boots and dropped his belt beside them. And oh, it had been a relief to lose the heavy black tunic and peel off the layers beneath. He'd closed his eyes, revelling in the caress of lake and sun. And he'd wanted to be_ clean.

_He'd kept his back to the shore as he flung away his trousers and waded in up to his waist._

_He wasn't sure how long he'd stood there before something splashed behind him. He'd turned to see Rey, crouching with the water up to her chin, her Force signature shining with pure wonder. He'd wondered whether she'd ever bathed in water before, and had known immediately that the answer was no._

_She'd blushed as he'd faced her, her gaze drifting over his face, his chest, further down... and he'd suddenly felt as exposed as he had the time she'd disturbed him while he was dressing. And something had stirred in him just as it had then, and he'd found himself advancing on her while she'd been torn between closing the distance or running into the trees, and so had done neither until he'd been close enough to touch her._

_He'd held out his hand, and she had come to him. He'd gathered her into his arms, and the sun had had_ nothing _on the feel of her skin against his._

_Her mind had opened to him like a blossoming flower and it had not just been her embracing him but the lake and the trees and the planet and the sun and the shadows and the Force itself._

_They had stood like that until the sun was low in the sky._

_There had been no need for words as they'd left the lake and nestled together under the peeping stars. He'd curled around her, feeling every breath she'd taken as the Force had pulsed between them._

_You're not alone…Neither are you… You're not alone… Neither are you…_

 

* * *

 

Rey took his hand as the _Falcon_ settled to the ground. Together, they watched the knot of people approach. Chewie was away on a mission, Rey had said, and a sneaking part of him was relieved to delay that confrontation. But his mother would be one of them. As would the friends she'd tried to hide her longing for when she'd visited him. A worm of self-doubt hissed that she'd want nothing to do with him, now they were all in the same place.

She leaned over and cupped his cheek. "You are _not_ alone."

There were more words, hovering unsaid. He was grateful she didn't speak them. Whether this would work out was down to more than just the two of them, and reassuring him of his own resilience only underlined his fear that this was too soon.

She kissed the top of his head, and then she was gone.

He waited. His first reunion would not be for public consumption.

He watched as she emerged from the shadow of the ship and ran towards her friends.

She would come back to him. She always had before.

The ex-stormtrooper threw his arms around her. She held him, cheek to cheek. They did not let go.

Ben breathed in slowly, straining for control.

Behind him, a cup smashed to the floor.

 

* * *

 

_The first night he'd spent without Rey, he'd woken screaming, unable to shake the visions of her laughing at him, sneering at his weakness, using him and leaving him alone just like everyone else in his life._

_The second night had been worse. He'd clawed himself awake from the nightmare, gone down to the lakeside and spent the rest of the night counting the stars._

_The third night he'd felt the shift in the Force that heralded her appearance. She had held him across the emptiness of space, and they had talked late into his night, and he had been woken by the gentle touch of dawn._

_He had always been isolated, but he'd never before been so_ alone. _On Takodana, there had been no routines, no state engagements, no appearances to keep up, and no voice whispering poison in his head. The silence had been a balm to his battered soul._

 _At first, the idleness had chafed. His need to_ do something _would burst out and he'd find himself sprinting through the forest or hoisting himself up a tree, or plunging naked into the lake and cutting through the water to one of its small islands. Only then would he be ready to meditate, feeling in the Force not the oppression and simmering anger of a ship full of humans but the darting energies of a myriad of life forms that swam and swooped and skittered in a dance that somehow made balance out of chaos._

_As his connection with the light side of the Force had grown stronger, so too had his connection to Rey. She'd started to come into focus more easily, her touch more solid. But it wasn't the same as having her with him._

_"So come back with me," she had said on one of her physical visits._

_That had been her original plan, he knew. Back when she'd believed that her conversations on Ahch-To had been with Ben Solo and not Kylo Ren. But although he had followed her, she'd realised that going to the Resistance with the half-and-half creature she'd rescued would have exploded into disaster._

_He needed to find his own balance._

 

* * *

 

The last time he'd felt his mother's presence, it had been overlain with his anger and her disappointment. She had known he had thrown away everything she had dreamed for him. He had known that he had failed to prove himself to Snoke and failed to save her regardless.

Until Rey had told him she was alive. And now he had to face the past he'd foolishly thought he could destroy.

He walked back to the corridor as she came up the ramp. She looked just like she did in the holovids, her hair piled high, her clothes regally sculpted, her eyes…

The way her eyes were shining was _nothing_ like the holovids. And the holovids could never capture the strength of her presence in the Force.

She put a hand to the wall. "Ben."

 _Mother_ , he tried to say. But he could not.

She should have been raging at him as he remembered her raging at his father when he'd gone away, or icily distant as she'd been to senators who'd crossed her. But none of that could be equal to what he had done to her.

"I'm sorry," she said.

That gave him his voice. " _You're_ sorry? I-"

She spoke over him. "I failed you, Ben. I shouldn't have sent you to Luke. I should have tried harder to reach you. I should never have stopped believing in you." Her voice broke. "All I ever wanted was to have you back."

The Force thickened between them; he felt her sorrow echo his own. And then he had his arms around her and her head was on his shoulder, and her tears soaked into his tunic as his fell onto her hair. And he remembered them standing like this, in the distant past that Snoke had made him bury, only then it had been him with his head on her shoulder as she'd held him safe against the world

She had cared. She'd always cared. He'd spent half his life living a lie and he could never make up for all the wrong he'd done.

He lurched against the wall and they slid to the floor, clinging to each other as his tears gave way to shuddering sobs. She cradled his head on her lap.

He squeezed his eyes shut. He couldn't face her. He couldn't face anything.

 _I'm sorry._ It would be too easy to say, too hopelessly inadequate. So he said nothing. He knew she could feel it anyway.

"Shh," she whispered, stroking his temple as if soothing the turmoil within. "You're welcome here."

He croaked a laugh at that. "No I'm not."

She squeezed his hand. He opened his eyes and looked into hers, brimming over with compassion. He didn't understand how she didn't hate him.

"I don't deserve forgiveness," he told her.

She smiled sadly. "Nobody ever does, Ben. You're my son. Deserving doesn't come into it."

 

* * *

 

_Into the sounds of leaves rustling and birds trilling had one day been woven the unmistakable whine of an old speeder bike._

_He'd ducked back into the trees, but the rider had skidded to a stop right where he'd just been meditating. The intruder had hopped down onto the sand and peered about._

_"BEN SOLO!"_

_Maz Kanata. Ben had groaned inwardly: he really should have expected this._

_She'd spread a blanket on the sand and sat, her back to the speeder, munching some sort of fruit._

_"I know you're here, boy," she'd called. "Come on out!"_

_It had been years since he'd seen Maz. His father had brought him to her cantina a couple of times; the tension and strangeness of the place had been an illicit thrill, but he'd never been comfortable with the proprietress. She always saw too much._

_But she couldn't actually harm him. And there'd clearly been no hiding from her._

_He'd settled himself on the other side of her blanket, and bit into the fruit she'd offered. He'd tried to ignore the way she was watching him._

_"So, the girl found you then."_

_"Rey?" He'd thought about the way she'd run from him, fought him, cursed him. "I hardly think she was looking for me."_

_The old pirate had smiled. "She thought she was looking for Luke. She had to discover the truth for herself. As did you."_

_He'd scowled. "What do_ you _know about my truth?"_

_"I know the Force. I know it brought you together. Did you think I wouldn't know you when you came to take her away?"_

_"It wasn't the Force," he'd said, unable to keep the bitterness from his voice. "It was Snoke. He linked us. He wanted to use me to get to her."_

_Maz had pulled a grey root from the pouch at her belt and chewed on it, slowly. "I'm sure he'd have wanted you to believe that," she'd said. "But even if it's true, how do you know that, too, wasn't down to the Force? That beast's plan only served to get him killed."_

_Rey must have told her about it, he'd realised. Those brief trips she'd made to fetch food and news and clothing that wasn't black must have taken her to Maz's domain._

_"Did she tell you I was here?" he'd asked._

_Maz had cackled. "She didn't have to, boy. Not after all you two have been doing to balance the Force."_

_Balance the Force? He'd frowned at her. Her eyes had gleamed with amusement._

_Oh._ Oh.

_He'd blushed, and studied the line of trees on the far side of the lake._

_So much for being alone._

_"No need to be shy with me, Ben Solo," she'd said. "Human lives are short. Don't waste yours."_

_"I think I've already done that."_

_She'd crawled across the blanket then. "When you've lived as long as I have," she'd said, pushing back her goggles and peering into his eyes, "you learn that nothing is wasted. Light, dark, Jedi, Sith: that pendulum will swing regardless. What you need to do is decide whether to give up and sit in the rubble, or to rebuild."_

_And that, he'd realised, was no choice at all. Not if he wanted to be with Rey._

 

* * *

 

He hadn't been able to face leaving the _Falcon_ with his mother. She may have wanted him back, but there were plenty of others here who did not. He needed to compose himself.

He sat in the cockpit watching the light fade to dusk, waiting for Rey to return.

He saw her slip out of a side door and across the apron, and heard her steps echo in the corridor behind him. And then she was hugging him from behind, before she pulled back and squeezed his shoulders.

"Come and eat," she said, and he let her lead him from the ship.

This planet was not as lush as Takodana, but it was still strong with the Force. He breathed it in, letting it flow through him, calming him.

The wall of sound as they entered the canteen stopped him in his tracks. Even on the _Finalizer_ he'd eaten alone, and after the peace on Takodana the noise here was like an all-out assault.

But Rey had spent her entire life in desert solitude. If she could cope with this, so would he.

He wanted to take her hand and he could feel that she wanted him to, but he didn't. The people here may not have known exactly who he was, but they did know he'd been the enemy. He couldn't afford to show weakness here and she couldn't afford to be damned by association with him.

And to think that only a few months ago he'd thought being by his side would _raise_ her status.

He was relieved when, having loaded up their trays, she led him to a private room. He was less relieved when he recognised the two men who waited for them. Two men who were only too well aware of what he had been.

He sat.

Rey looked between them, suddenly uncertain. "Er… Ben, this is Poe and Finn."

"We've met," said Dameron.

Rey blushed. Ben glared at him. Weren't these two supposed to be her friends? He expected Dameron to be hostile – after all, the last time he'd seen him the man had been screaming bloody defiance. But there was no need for him to embarrass Rey.

Dameron leaned across the table. "Just so you know, I'm not on board with this. You may have persuaded Rey to trust you, but I don't. Try anything, and you'll have me to answer to."

Ben shrugged. Kylo would have sneered and retorted that the pilot wouldn't have been able to stop him. And it would have been true, but Ben had no need to say so.

"He'll answer to Leia, "said Rey. "And to me. We've _been_ through this, Poe."

"You didn't see him on Jakku," the pilot retorted. He glared at Ben. "You should be dead for what you did in Tuanul, never mind everything else. The _only_ reason you aren't is because there's a chance that what you can give us will save more people than you've already killed."

The words had changed since that room on the _Finalizer_ , but the self-righteousness hadn't. Ben tilted his head, observing the anger Dameron was projecting, and everything else tangled behind it. "You're still feeling guilty," he said. "You shouldn't. You being there made no difference."

Dameron shoved back his chair and stood. For a moment Ben thought he was going to hit him, but the pilot just shook his head in disgust. "Leia deserved better than you, _Ben._ So does Rey." He strode out of the door and slammed it behind him.

Rey squeezed his hand. Ben could feel her discomfort, her damnable loyalty to all three of them and her impossible wish that they wouldn't hate each other.

The former stormtrooper just watched them and glowered.

 

* * *

 

_Snoke's gold plating had been good for more than whatever weapons Rey had traded it for. Ben didn't know which junkyard she'd found the rustbucket speeder in, but he'd been glad to have it. He'd needed a bigger horizon than one lake and its valley._

_Maz's building site had been a bone-jarring three hour ride away, but Ben had found himself being drawn to it more and more as the weeks passed. He'd supposed it was fair enough that he help with the rebuilding, given that he'd been responsible for the attack that had destroyed it in the first place, but above that, the work itself had been a relief. It was hard to overthink things when manhandling rocks._

_The first time he'd ventured into the marquee that served as her temporary cantina, he'd kept to the shadows. He'd always been kept apart from other people, and he'd had no idea how to strike up a conversation with someone who wasn't too scared not to talk to him. It had been easier when doing the work; the others might have found him odd, but they'd respected his strength. And everyone there had scars of some kind. No one had wanted to discuss the past; it was better to live in the present and build for the future. Let the past die._

_He knew it couldn't stay dead forever._

_To his relief, Maz had not drawn attention to him, though on more than one occasion he'd caught her watching. He found he didn't mind. As a boy he had hated knowing that she saw what he hid from others. But now she was looking at what others refused to see._

 

* * *

 

Ben took a deep breath of the fresh night air. The stars were different here, the darkness above more tinged with blue. But there was peace, especially compared to the hubbub inside.

If he tried, he would be able to locate Rey's Force signature, and his mother's, but he didn't need to. He could feel Rey's anxious reassurance through the bond, and an indistinct mix of relief and guilt that resonated with his mother's familiar strength.

 _Mother._ It was going to take some time before that word felt natural again, after so many years pretending she was dead to him. Perhaps she felt the same way. Perhaps that's why she had chosen not to eat with them tonight; that bothered him more than it should have. But perhaps it would have bothered him more to navigate their shattered relationship in front of the others.

Footsteps thudded behind him. He turned. Pain exploded across his face. He stumbled back, his hand to his nose, as his assailant kicked at his leg. He fell to the ground. A boot swung. Ben flung out his hand and _pushed_.

It was the stormtrooper. The man yelled as he landed heavily on the duracrete. "Showing your true colours now, aren't you?" he snarled. "You think you can just walk in here after what you did to Poe? To Han? To _Rey?_ "

Ben couldn't stop the anger rising. "You know _nothing_ about what's between me and Rey!"

"I know you've cast some sort of Force spell on her." He scrambled to his feet. "She _hated_ you! She'd never have chosen to go to you!"

Ben clenched his fists and took a slow breath in. And out. None of it was true, he _knew_ that. But this man who claimed to be her friend was insulting not just her but the beautiful precious bond between them.

He reached out to the Force, to life, to hope. But the flowers and birds were asleep, and the night was full of hunters.

He froze the other man in place. Slowly, he got to his feet and prowled towards him. He could taste his fear now, and it shouldn't have been so sweet but this creature had insulted the woman who had saved him.

He punched him, hard. The man fell at his feet. And it was every bit as satisfying as it had been in the woods on Starkiller.

He knelt. He curled his fingers. The man in front of him gasped and clawed at his throat.

Something touched his shoulder. He brushed it away and leaned towards his prey. "What makes you think you have the _right_ to say what she should choose?"

"-ey…"

"Ben!"

Ben was dea- _No!_

He released his hold. The two men stared at each other in horror.

Rey knelt in front of him, her hands on his shoulders. "Ben? What happened?"

"Stay away from him!" the traitor snarled. "He attacked me!"

Ben stared at the ground. So that had been the plan, and he'd fallen for it. He'd not been on the base for half a day and he'd almost killed someone. Someone whom she for some inexplicable reason cared about. Someone who had just demonstrated the glaring defect in their new tool.

"Ben?" She brushed his forehead. Her roiling fear made him feel sick.

"Go ahead and look."

She closed her eyes, and her mind nudged his as she felt out the shape of what had happened. He held nothing back.

She took his hands. "You came back."

"Only because you were here." He had no excuse to offer: not to her, not to himself, not to anyone. Pushing Finn away had been self-defence, but everything after that had been something he thought he'd left far behind. "He's right. You shouldn't care about me."

Her lips trembled. "Too late." And then her arms were around him and her head was on his shoulder and he knew she could feel his anger and his pain and how he struggled against it and for some Force-forsaken reason she loved him anyway.

"It's not your responsibility to keep him on a leash," the other man growled.

He felt her anger flash. "And it's not your responsibility to _provoke_ him!"

"He tried to kill me!"

"And what exactly were you trying to do?"

"Finn?" Dameron appeared silhouetted in the doorway. He ran towards them. "What the kriff happened?"

He looked at Finn's bloody nose, and Ben's.

"Get him off the base," he said to Rey. "This is too dangerous."

Rey sat back and stared at Dameron. "Send him away, and I go too," she said.

Ben stared at her. Had she really said she'd go with him? If she was with him, he wouldn't care if they chased him away from here. Except...

Dameron ran his hand through his hair. "But Rey-"

"I'll be only too happy to leave," Ben cut in. "But only if _my mother_ asks me to."

Dameron scowled. "Leia will see sense. If you've got something to give us, you can do it somewhere else."

And then the pilot could go back to pretending that Ben didn't exist? That _he_ was really her son? No. Ben wasn't having that, not now.

"Then we're staying," said Rey. "If you think that Leia cares more about information that's probably out of date by now than about _her son_ , you really don't know her very well. This isn't about saving the resistance. This is about saving _him_."

Ben barely noticed the rest of the argument. He didn't care about Dameron's glare as the pilot pulled his friend to his feet and helped him limp away. All that mattered was that Rey really did think of him as some _one_ and not some _thing._ That she wanted _him_ , that she was prepared to walk away from the place she'd carved out for herself here if it meant they could be together.

He hoped it wouldn't come to that. She didn't deserve to lose her friends because of him. And if being here was difficult for him - well, he'd been in far worse places. And without her. This would be as good a place as any to turn his back on the rubble of his mistakes and start to rebuild.

But all he cared about now was that her hand had found his again, and with their fingers entwined he could feel how she'd meant it, how she'd felt his pain and understood, how she knew he understood that his pain excused nothing, how she still loved him anyway. Just as he knew she could feel his love shining back. 

He might never understand it, he might never be worthy of it, but he would never doubt her choice again.


End file.
